söndag 29 maj 2016

Yesterday I, my husband, and our daughter wnt to Jönköping, ca 1,5- 2 hours to the east of Gothenburg, to celebrate hubby's mother's 80th birthday. On the way to Jönköping you pass Borås, the centre for textile, garments and mail order industries in Sweden and we made a quick stop at Furulunds, a fabric store.

They're not super cheap, but not very expensive either and I found lovely thin 100% wool in a soft light red colour, which I bougt five metres of to make tunics for me and hubby.They're (of course) going to be in the 13th-early 14th century style and I plan to use the trim I bought in Florence around the neck and cuffs.

I also found a wool (or wool mix) remnant measuring 1,5X1,5 metres and I'll think that I might make one half of a mi-parti tunic for someone in the family from it.

tisdag 24 maj 2016

Ever since I saw that there were painted glasses preserved from13th and early 14th century Europe (most painted glasses seem to be from the 16th century or later) I wanted to paint a pair of them for the me and baron Måns (they will of course become part of the regalia for the barony of Gotvik, so later barons and baronesses will use them too).

Beaker by Aldrevandini, second half of the 13th century, image from Bildindex.de

I spent quite a while looking for glasses with the rigth beaker shape, but they were nowehere to be found. I didn't even find the right shape among historical reproduction glass. Probably beace they are more interested in reproducing the "funny" shapes, siuch as this one, which I also have a repro of.

I was also a bit wary about hardening glass paint in the oven on a historical repro glass, since I don't know how they would react to the heat. Still, I would have tried it if I had found the right shape.

I trawled internet auction sites for something with a shape that would work, but in the end I accepted my fate and ordered beer glasses from barshopen. I've ordered glasses for painting from there before and I know that they are sturdy. The beaker shape isn't very popular for beer glasses either and this was as close as I could get:

As you can see it has cut and frosted parts, which isn't very medieval. it also has the amount engraved on it, but both these could be hidden with paint. The shape was the best I could get so I went for them.

I used ordinary paint for glass, the kind you harden in a household oven. I had them at home already due to previous painting projects. The white was paint and the other colours pens.

The arms are of course those of Gotvik, and the text says: Gotvik Baronia Clarissima, that is: "Gotvik, the most shining barony", which is what the barony of Gotvik usually present themselves as.

måndag 23 maj 2016

As the faithful reader know costuming isn't my only hobby; I also do calligraphy and illumination and here are a few that I haven't shown before.

Various Award of Arms

I'm very happy with the leaves in the initial, I haven't done them before.

Ragnhild the wise, Gotvik's award for Arts&Science

The Golden Ribbon, the Principality of Nordmark's award for service. Normally I remove the religious elements when I copy the design, but since the recipient is a vicar in real life and a canon in the society I kept teh rising Christ and added a kneeling Morten.

A thank you scroll to Ylffwa Yrwädher for her excellent work as chatelaine for Attemark.

This is for the Order of the Ancient Dolphin, given to former barons and baronesses of Gotvik. I also modeled a seal from fimo clay to make wax seals.

The heart of St. Egon, Gotvik award for service.

This one is special, because Maja made the calligraphy and I did the illumination. It's for one of her best friends and Maja's first illumination.

lördag 21 maj 2016

Yesterday I finished the printed gown. It has taken less time than expected, though for a bad reason: my arthirtis is right now so bad that I can't sit in front of a computer longer times, and even when I don't do that it hurts too much to do any serious thinking. As a university teacher this means that I can't work. I also feel like I have a temperature and need a lot of rest.

And the only way to stand the pain is a) to take tramadol and b) to try and distract myself. Hence lots of sewing.

The fabric is wool that I have hand printed a pattern on with modern textile paint. The cut is based on the gown of St. Elisabeth of Thuringia, from the 13th century. The buttons are made from red wool.

The gown is partly machine sewn - that is: the straigth seams are sewn on machine. But it's amazing how much hand work there still is on a machine sewn gown: All the seams are felled by hand. All hems are of course made by hand, and for the sleeve openings that meant first whipping down the edges, then sewing a bias strip over that and then making the buttonholes. And the buttons.

Anyway, the pain means that I can't focus (or sit long) enough to write the documentation for the gown right now. It will hopefully happen soon. If I rest and if I'm lucky and this flare goes down.

About the blog

A blog about historical costuming and the history of dress, mostly from the period 1000 to 1600, but with occasional excursions into the 17th, 18th and 19th centuries.

The blog started as a way for me too try and make the information from my old costuming web page that I started over ten years ago more accessible. Most of the content was moved over, and you find the content of the old web pages as pages, listed to the left in the blog. Gradually more, new, costumes are added, but in the blog you also find posts about dress history in general, not only stuff that I have made.